Come home

My legs are sore. Hmmm, maybe not sore, but very very tired. Yesterday, after an amazing church service, I grabbed a quick bite to eat and headed out to run. Yesterday was an 8-mile day. I hadn't run that far since my last half marathon. In fact, that distance was the farthest I had run in my training runs for all of the half marathons. Which by the way makes NO sense to me; here, only go run 8 miles to get ready for 13.1 miles. The last 5 miles....well its up to you to survive, just wing it. NO SENSE AT ALL! But anywho, within the first tenth of a mile I realized I hadn't let my food digest enough...uh oh! SIDE ACHE ATTACK! I had to run a good mile with my hand pinching my side as hard as I could just so I could keep going. But I did and soon that pain and been replaced with the pain of hills. Oh hills. They slow your pace down, they make you want to give up and cry for your mommy to come save you. I saw this great shirt at Nike Town that said "If I stop running, how will I get home?" So that was the mantra I kept telling myself. I also thought a lot about Molly Hightower. She wouldn't have stopped. So I kept going, somehow conquering one hill after the other. One the way back to finish the first loop and pick A up to run the last part of my loop with me, I started to well, have some issues. How do I say this lady like....I had to "tout" A LOT! It was quite embarrassing and I prayed and hoped that the walkers and runners that were going the opposite direction, didn't think I was the stinkiest woman alive. But, hey we are just keeping it real people. Lesson learned, let my food digest before I go and run.

When I saw A I knew he was going to convince me to keep going and I was going to fight with him and tell him I wanted to stop. He won. The hills were brutal in the last 3 miles. I had to often scream out to my manly man..."I can't freakin run that fast anymore!" I think he got the picture, as he slowed down and told me I was doing great. As we looped back around I could see home. I knew I had made it back home, with an 8 mile training run done. Home never looked so good.

Isn't that what Christ is trying to tell us everyday? "Come home to Me." It says right there in the Bible that God will say, fine if you want to go and not come home to me, go. Go ahead and live without me, but you will hit bottom. You will live a life, where you will soon come to realize that the pigs are living better then you. And as we read this, it becomes very clear, that God is being quite harsh. And we might even take offense to this. But then, if we kept reading we would see how gracious and loving our God is. He says, when you have hit rock bottom, when you can go no longer, when no one loves you, you can ALWAYS come home. The light is on. He will always accept us, He will erase our sins and love us. Christ's home, is the home I want to come home to. His love and grace is something that is a daily reminder that we serve the God that is more like a father then anything else. His arms are wide open, waiting for us to come home to Him.

Home never looked so good.

But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on the wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not feel faint.